October 10, 2007
Vandalism Suit Reminds: Hate Begins At Home
 Remodeling suggestion for the boys’ rooms |
Last year, Keri Fuchs and Linda Boutaugh were in the process of moving away from their home in Poland, Maine, when two filthy little creeps broke in and vandalized the couple’s house and car.
Notes WBZ-TV:
Rooms were looted for valuables, a family urn was stolen, furniture and shelving was destroyed and their belongings were sprayed with a fire extinguisher.
Sexual obscenities were scrawled on walls and the word “dykes” was painted on a wall using the women’s art supplies…
What the above article doesn’t mention is that human feces were also smeared on the walls. It also doesn’t mention that this wasn’t the first time Fuchs and Boutaugh had been targeted by the hate-fueled monsters in their neighborhood.
At the time of the house-trashing, Maine Today columnist Bill Nemitz wrote:
[The local kids would] tromp through the woods out back and, when Fuchs asked them to respect her private property, respond with words too vile to print here. They’d ride by on their bicycles and holler the same things whenever Fuchs and Boutaugh had the nerve to sit out in front of their home and enjoy a quiet summer evening.
One time, while the women weren’t home, the kids even cut the clothesline and tore up the drying laundry.
“We tried to report it,” Boutaugh said. Nothing came of it.
And that’s why Fuchs and Boutaugh decided to leave Poland and move to East Millinocket:
They were there on one of their first moving trips when a neighbor called on June 30 and told them they’d better get back down here — the old Pontiac Parisienne that Boutaugh had spent months restoring had all its windows knocked out and it looked as though the house had been trashed, too.
“These paintings were all done by my mother,” Fuchs said, pointing to the pictures with the shattered glass. “Look, this one even got torn. And they stole all kinds of things. … They even took the urn with my father’s ashes. Why would someone take something like that?”
Now, WBZ reports, Fuchs and Boutaugh are suing the parents of the vandals…
…claiming trespass, emotional distress and violation of the Maine Civil Right Act.
. . .
A judge ordered an injunction against both boys under the Maine Civil Rights Act. Police said one of the boys pleaded guilty and was sentenced to drug court.
The women are alleging negligent supervision of the minors, saying the boys’ parents failed to appropriately supervise their children. The suit does not specify a damage amount.
When the incident occurred, it drew widespread attention and a rally in Portland drew about 200 people including Gov. John Baldacci, U.S. Rep. Tom Allen and Attorney General Steven Rowe who turned out to show their support for the women.
Good. We’d like to see both little perps sentenced to, say, a few years’ community service cleaning up other criminals’ anti-gay graffiti — but the only way to put a stop to this is ultimately through the parents.
Where, after all, do you think children get the idea that it’s fun to destroy property because the owners are gay?
Bill Nemitz understands:
It’s bigotry, plain and simple. And hard as it might be to fathom at these ages — are you listening, Mom and Dad? — it had to come from somewhere.
“What you see is what you learn,” Boutaugh said, looking out at her soon-to-be ex-neighborhood. “Hate is learned at home.”
Filed under: Hate Crimes, United States
